Shawls

Sunday warmed up a lot after I posted the blocking photos and the shawl dried very quickly so I took it for a walk in the park in the afternoon. The weather obliged by being almost perfectly still most of the time and the clocks hadn’t changed yet, making for some great light.

We took a short walk around the area in front of the Academy of Sciences:

And continued on the walkway around the Music Concourse:

And stopped at a park bench on the way home so you could get another good look at the crocheted bind-off edging:

Pattern: Peacock Feathers Shawl by Dorothy Siemens, available from Fiddlesticks Knitting
Yarn: 2/3 skein JaggerSpun Zephyr Wool-Silk 2/18 lace weight (2/3 of 150g ball, 1665 yards), 50% merino wool, 50% tussah silk, color: Peacock (what else?)
Needles: size 4 Addi Turbo lace needles and size E crochet hook for border
Finished size: 78″ across top, 41″ straight up the middle, 56″ each side
Started 10/2 and finished 10/25/2009

For the sake of accuracy here, I looked up the Cervantes statue that’s in Golden Gate Park, the one I use for hat photos sometimes. I always call it the Cervantes statue even though I know only the disembodied head at the top of the sculpture is the man himself. I wanted to know who it was kneeling at his feet. I give you Don Quixote with his buddy Sancho Panza. Don is the one cross-dressed for a night out:

I got some amused looks from passersby when they saw me staging that one. The wind had picked up and I took about 45 shots trying to get one that didn’t have the shawl flapping in the breeze so I was there a while.

The pink blob grows, slowly, slowly, on the bus. I had to wad it up to make it an unrecognizable blob for its photo shoot (recipient views my Flickr feed):

I don’t know if I have enough yarn to finish this. Pout. Which means I’m working on it more slowly, as though I don’t want to find out for sure that I don’t have enough yarn. I frequently find myself doing this when it looks like I’m fighting a losing knitting battle. I know working more slowly makes the yarn last longer, calendar-wise, but doesn’t make it go any further in a project. It’s my irrational knitting thing and the reason there are 5 sweaters in progress for me in the apartment on which I have not made any progress in months or even years.

Yardage surety is a great thing: the last (or perhaps I should say latest, in case she decides she wants more) of a series of hiking socks for my mom is also underway:

Yup, right now, as I write this, this is what’s happening in the apartment:

It’s big. 78″ across the top and 56″ down each side. I will need to buy more of those blocking mats because these are sliding around on the floor. That’s one set of 9 that I bought from KnitPicks a couple of months ago. I don’t think I mentioned it at the time but they smelled strongly of those chalky candy Valentine hearts, the ones that have little words on them, when I got them and I had to leave them out to air for a week before I could use them. They still smell a little but I only notice it now when I’m crawling around them and bending down to stab them with pins. Crawling around on those is infinitely more comfortable than crawling around the bulletin board I’ve used in the past.

Look at those feathers!

It’s warm-ish today (65 degrees in here) so it should dry by afternoon. I’ll go charge the camera’s batteries now so I can do a photo shoot in the park later.

Yesterday I read a knitting blog that listed some of the kooky and amusing search terms folks used to find her blog. I thought that was interesting and looked at my blog’s statistics and let’s just say anyone who searches for those terms and finds my blog is going to be sorely disappointed. The bulk of them are not knitting-related and most are not for a PG-13 or even R audience. How on earth I’m a hit for those terms is beyond me. But I think you see it in the statistics even if you’re hit number 2,382,489 and no one’s ever going to browse down that far in a search engine.

Today’s post title is courtesy of the creator of Savage Chickens, who kindly commented on my 10/13/2009 post. This is a great badass name for the tools of my trade!

So, behold, I give you my collection of yarn impalers. I feel I should display them in a more threatening manner, given their new moniker. Perhaps with the points up.

Yes, photo is staged with extraneous files/papers/fiber/yarn removed to influence my readers’ opinion of me. Desk is never this neat.

I haven’t used the 14″-long straights in so long that I considered unloading them at my yard sale. Didn’t, obviously. The 10″ ones still come in handy. I use them when working on small back-and-forth projects with yarns that slide off the ends of the Addi Turbos in an annoying manner and only when not on the bus. Lots of criteria there, hence not much use. Although the hand spindles you see don’t get used much I’m not about to let go of those.

The circulars and double-points get the most use and I store them in zippered binder pouches, labeled by size, that I hooked together with rings. This arrangement folds flat to slide under my side of the sofa:

Looking at this photo all I can think of is Barney Gumble and his “Number 8″ album he recorded after leaving The Be Sharps. Ha!

The Peacock Feathers Shawl is finished but hasn’t gone swimming yet. Here’s the proof:

Also going this week is a secret project for someone who views my Flickr feed so I can’t take a proper photo. Here’s a peek:

All I can say is this is not socks.

The number of rows remaining:

Believe me, it is much larger than it looks all squashed up on the needles.

When a bird is molting, its feathers can look ruffled and scruffy until the new, smooth ones come in. So, here I give you a molting Peacock Feathers shawl:

I don’t know what else to call feathers that have gone this far off course so quickly. You’ll notice the shawl is off the needles. Sigh. A few nights ago I noticed a mistake about 11 rows back on one half. I say “about 11 rows” because I’m still not sure where I went wrong but could see exactly where I went right. After nearly an hour of tinking in an attempt to locate precisely where things went awry, I gave up and frogged. I am tonight just past where I was several days ago.

The feathers that aren’t wonky are looking pretty nice:

It has again been more than a week since I posted, and so I have a few more finished projects to share. At long last, the golden October scarf:

Pattern: own (3×3 slanting rib)
Yarn: Tausendschön Handgefärbte Sockenwolle, 75% superwash wool, 25% nylon, color: Goldener Oktober
Needles: size 3
Size: 4.5″ x 59″
Started 8/27 and finished 10/2/2009

And, of course, another hat. Because it wouldn’t be a work week without a hat:

Pattern: own
Yarn: Steinbach Wolle Aktiv Effect, color 63984, held together with KnitPicks Essential, color 23696 (Ash), both 75% superwash wool, 25% nylon
Needles: size 4
Size: adult large
Started 10/2 and finished 10/10/2009

I forgot to share one more thing from when my houseguest was here. Fabulous housekeeper that I am, I pretty much piled everything that was lying around the living room in the bedroom, intending to not show off the bedroom. However, during the 3-minute tour of the apartment, she did peek in and saw, amongst papers to file and the Goodwill pile, the tub of scrap yarns I didn’t shove back under the bed (you know, out of sight, out of mind, and I’m trying to remember to use some of it every week). Her comment: “that’s a big stash of yarn.” Her exact word was “Vorrat,” which means stockpile or hoard. My reply: “that’s not even my stash, those are just the scraps.” Ahem. Perhaps I should have kept my big mouth shut.

Excuse me while I go play in what non-knitting guests refer to as an impressive stockpile. Until I post again, see if you can come up with a badass name for knitting needles. I refer you to one of my favorite Savage Chickens comics.

Ta da! I present to you Mystery Stole 4. It amazes me, always, how lace changes after blocking. Here it is as an unimpressive, crumpled mess:

And the beauty it turned into once I got it on wires:

Pattern: Mystery Stole 4 (Serendipity Stole) by Georgina Bow Creations
Yarn: 1.75 skeins (2 oz, 630 yards each) JaggerSpun Zephyr silk/wool, 50% Chinese Tussah silk, 50% merino wool, color: Channel (I wonder if they mean Claret and not Channel, but it’s clearly labeled Channel)
Needles: size 4
Started 9/5/2008 and finished 11/28/2008

The yarn is simply fabulous. This is the first time I have used Zephyr and it both feels great while knitting and finished wonderfully after blocking. I am looking forward to hauling out the teal Zephyr I bought for the Peacock Feathers Shawl when it’s time to get going on that one.

Although mystery projects appear to be popular in blogland and on Ravelry, I doubt I’ll do another one. I thought it would be fun doing something completely unexpected, and while I really and truly enjoyed knitting it (and the instructions are good), the resulting stole is not my style. I like more traditional patterns. But that’s just my personal taste, and since I make lots of items to give away or sell, I tend to make lots of things that don’t fit my taste. I still enjoy making them. Please understand my statement is not a criticism of the stole itself, just of my picky taste.

Anyway, likes and dislikes aside, the instructions are well-written. I chose to knit both halves at once and managed to accomplish this in 7 weeks. There was a huge gap of time during which I didn’t work on it at all, hence the long start to finish time.

I had some problems with executing the grafting directions. The designer asks you to work one extra row at each end of the stole in a smooth waste yarn, then graft, following the path of the waste yarn. I found this completely impossible and ended up doing a three-needle bind-off of those two waste yarn rows, then grafting over the bound-off row of waste yarn. Afterward, I snipped the waste yarn to remove it and snipped a bit too quickly (Mr. MmmYarn, watching me, actually cringed but didn’t say anything until I discovered the hole), so in addition to testing my grafting skills, I got the added bonus of testing my repairing skills. Which I am happy to say look pretty good. I then had to tighten my graft stitch by stitch as going over 3 waste yarn rows made it really loose.

My mom saw the work in progress when she visited in November and wanted to know how I got the beads on there. I showed her my tiny crochet hook, to which she responded, “how do you even see that?” I guess she has a point. Here’s my attempt at getting a photo of the hook, on a dime for scale, and its head is so tiny that the camera can’t really pick it up. This was the best shot (click for big):

See that big, glittery pile? I was concerned about not having enough beads when I bought the replacement beads in Paris. Ha! Foolish knitter! I have plenty of beads left over to use in another project someday.

As usual, shawls and stoles are a great knitting deal where you get lots of knitting for a small financial investement. Those skeins of Zephyr were under $11 each, meaning I made this whole thing for $20 of yarn and probably $3 worth of beads (given I paid $15 for the beads and have a LOT left over). I couldn’t say for sure how many hours I spent on this thing, but I’d venture a guess at 80 hours. So what’s that, 28 cents an hour? Now that’s entertainment.

I saw the pile of knitting on my side of the sofa over the weekend and realized last week’s finished projects represent a basic kindergarten primary color assortment.

First up, a bright blue hat:

Pattern: own
Yarn: Wolle Roedel Universal Superwash, 100% superwash merino wool, color 835
Needles: size 3 and 4
Size: adult average
Started 11/5 and finished 11/13/2008

I designed this one for Mr. MmmYarn and he found it to be fine in the house, but outdoors his ears were cold so he requested a long, folded brim. I have re-made the hat in the same yarn, this time with a big brim. He’ll get to try it on tomorrow. I’m going to try to write a pattern for it in a couple of sizes but that won’t be ready for a few weeks, I’m sure.

Next up, a long, skinny, yellow scarf:

Pattern: own
Yarn: Schoenbuch Garne Superba 100 4-Fach; 37.5% cotton, 37.5% superwash wool, 25% nylon; color 214
Needles: size 4
Size: 4.5″ x 78″
Started 11/10 and finished 11/28/2008

Even though to my eyes the yarn reads as a yellow, it is composed of two plies of yellow and two plies of white. I didn’t do a burn test, but the yellow looks and feels like the wool and the white looks and feels like the cotton. The chevron pattern is a simple k3 p3 rib on 31 stitches that I shifted one stitch to either side on each row.

And to complete our collection of primary colors, a flash of red:

Sunday was warm so the Mystery Stole dried the same day. Does crawling around on the floor around your blocking bulletin board for an hour count as exercise? Non-aerobic, of course, but definitely a lot of bending and stretching, crouching and reaching. It must count as something as I was incredibly sore Monday morning and am still feeling the effects today.

And where’s the green? I know it’s not primary, but it’s usually included in the grouping of primary colors when a fourth color is called for. Well, the green Apres Surf Hoodie is up next after the re-worked hat. I’m about less than halfway through the hood, having ripped out a good 4.5″ tonight after finding a mistake (!) that I thought I spotted a few weeks ago but must have buried in the back of my in-denial brain. Tonight I decided I couldn’t live with that wonky row in the middle of the lace pattern and out it went!

The craft fair I mentioned a couple of posts ago was a bust this year. I sold one hat. This will in no way finance a yarn crawl at Stitches West, especially not an Mmm… Yarn- sized crawl. That’s OK, though, as work is going to try to hold a second one just before Valentine’s Day, which falls conveniently before Stitches West. I hope the day they hold it is cold enough to freeze one’s ears; I sell much more stuff on cold days than on warm ones.

It has been a rough two months here chez Mmm… Yarn, with more rough months to follow, but the knitting must go on. Blogging will continue to be sporadic.

I decided to knit both halves of Mystery Stole 4 at the same time, so side #1 got held up a bit while I got side #2 going.

You can see the little bit of glistening in the fabric, my tiny beads (the head of the crochet hook I’m using to add beads is nearly invisible in the photo). I mis-remembered the instructions at the bead store and bought blending-in beads rather than contrasting beads, so all you’ll ever see is some glistening in mine. I switched from Addi lace needles to short straight needles the other night which has sped things up a bit again.

I’m just halfway through the chart on clue #1 and clue #2 gets released Friday. I would be going faster, but I re-injured that top knuckle on my ring finger Sunday when a woman ahead of me on an escalator answered her cell phone a few steps from the bottom, then stopped stock-still at the end of the last stair to have her conversation. I managed to scramble backwards two stairs before the escalator ran me into her, nearly knocking her over, and in a chain-reaction effect, she knocked her kid over. Then she had the nerve to ask me what I thought I was doing. Ah, humans. However, it is noteworthy that it was not me being a klutz that caused the problem this time.

The little black purse is not going to make it into the suitcase Thursday night. Seed stitch is by nature slow, but there is also the problem of using an unknown quantity of yarn. Here’s what I had so far in the new size:

You’ll note I used the word “had”: that bit of Sherlock on the tube is all I have left; there’s no way it’s going to make it to square size. I grumbled a little about this at knitting group on Monday night and my friend suggested I look in Chinatown. She was right. I went there on my lunch break yesterday, and found something that will go on vacation with me:

A little cutesy for my taste, but the right size and style for dressing up a little to go out to dinner. Tonight’s pre-trip tasks include plant care, dealing with library books, ironing (ugh), and making wardrobe and knitting project decisions.

The Apres Surf Hoodie will stay home. I’m about a third of the way up the hood. It’s too big for travel knitting now.

The first clue for Mystery Stole 4 was released yesterday mid-morning to the joy of everyone eagerly awaiting the launch of this project. I was at work when it hit the Internet, and had also forgotten my MS4 supplies at home so I couldn’t get going on my lunch break, so I did not begin until last night’s round of travel planning was complete.

This is what I have so far:

That’s the first three rows, including the very slow row of one bead every other stitch. I have not yet searched the Internet to see who’s already done with clue #1 and who’s stuck bemoaning the first row of beads. My progress is going to be somewhat hampered the first week:

Goodness knows what I did to that top knuckle. I asked Mr. MmmYarn if he noticed me cursing after running into something somewhere and he just laughed and asked “which time?”. He knows I am such a klutz that it’s often hard to pinpoint which klutzy event caused the minor injury. This one, however, is not minor in my opinion — it’s cutting into knitting time (!!) and making typing hard.

The flat purse for travel is coming along slowly, too:

This is the Small Origami Bag in Folk Bags. At first I merrily cast on 64 stitches as instructed and knitted for 10″. Then I noticed it’s supposed to be a 14″ square and as I don’t want a chapstick-only bag, I measured my gauge (grrr… should have done that to begin with), ripped out, cast on 90 stitches, and started again. Then injured myself. Ah, well.

The yarn I’m using is Artfibers Sherlock (they don’t have it anymore); it looks like a small knitted tube. Click for the big version of the photo:

It’s hard to photograph but you can see that bit of white background peeking out between the strands of the chained tube. Sherlock likes to split so I have to knit carefully. Since being forced to slow down it’s working better, actually, as I’m not racing along willy-nilly, splitting the yarn every few stitches.